Poor DNC Flash leads to questions
Sat Mar 20, 2004 at 05:18:37 PM PDT
(
I agree with all of this -- kos)
There have been a number of posts here today about the new Flash animation "ad" posted at the DNC website.
It is worse than amateurish. It is embarrassing and richly deserving of the derision it has received here and on national political programs.
And it points to larger issues our Party has with comminications strategies, messaging/themes, and dissemination of our key messaging.
I posted
this diary yesterday on the topic of developing "headline" themes for the Kerry campaign and methods for disseminating those themes into our marketplace of voters.
There were many great ideas floated by DKos denizens, and should the subject be given front page status (since the diaries just go whizzing by), I am sure we would generate dozens more great ideas for the DNC.
As noted in that diary, Rove and Gillespie have done an excellent job of disseminating their key talking points for any given day/week and making suer they have Party mouthpieces in place to drive those key poinst home... over and over and over.
This week's national security/defense attack on Kerry was carried out by Bush in a speech, Cheney in a speech, Rumsfeld on the Sunday morning circuit, Rice on the network news, Hannity and Limbaugh from their media pulpits, in print and and electronic media by mouthpieces like David Brooks (who appeared on both NPR and The News Hour in addition to his Times column), and other sources. They all were "on message" and on point. It was a coordinated attack, executed strongly.
We seem to get little or no such coordination out of our Party leadership and/or the Kerry campaign. And that should be worrisome to us all.
Then, today, we get e-mails from the DNC touting that pathetic, new Flash. How embarrassing. Our candidate spends the week getting lambasted and we come up with that.
While Terry McAuliffe may be a fundraiser extraordinaire, he has proven less adept at communications strategy and execution (along the lines of Rove and Gillespie).
And after I had look at that lame Flash, I was angry... angry because I started thinking, is this what our contributions to the DNC are buying? Garbage like this?
So, acting on a tip from Drew posted in another diary on the new Flash, I did a little digging.
The Flash was produced by a company called The Chameleon Group. Their website is horrible. And, oddly, it never mentions anywhere on the site the company's key personnel. That's odd for an advertising/marketing firm. (Note: I am in the advertising and marketing business and have been for 20 years, the last 13 years running my own company with a partner.)
A further look into The Chameleon Group's website reveals some godawful, lame copy (on top of the pathetic, non-design of the website), and a hint that The Chamelseon Group isn't really an advertising firm at all, at least in the classic sense of having designers and/or writers on staff.
Their philospohy page includes the following paragraph:
At Chameleon we believe that every project is unique. That is why we custom build teams for each of our clients initiatives. The teams consist of individuals and small companies that are carefully selected to satisfy the requirements of each particular assignment.
In other words, they're not an actual ad/marketing firm. Their front page states:
Chameleon is a consortium of individuals and companies assembled for the express purpose of creating outstanding integrated communication solutions.
The phone number they have on their contact page (212.695.4644) when run through the reverse directory is listed to a different address than the address they list on their contact page.
(519 8th Ave Fl 22, New York in the reverse directory and in a whois search, and 430 West 34th Street, Suite 17D, New York on their website contact page.)
I guess my question is, why isn't the DNC hiring a professional firm and not some "consortium" of who knows what to do our marketing?
Ultimately, their spending our donations on creating these things. What did that Flash cost? And why was it awarded to The Chameleon Group?
When shoddy work is presented, we, as the Democrats who help fund the organization to pay for that shoddy work, deserve answers.
And we certainly deserve better work.
And on the subject of major themes and inititiaives and the coordination of the dissemination of those themes, we seem to need a better plan.
We're getting thumped in the communication war that is part of this campaign.
We need to do better if we expect to take back the White House in November.
Add your thoughts/comments/suggestions here.
